OPINION: Farmers must be optimists or they wouldn't still be a farmer. Farming is built on self-assurance that the work done today will pay off down the road, that the financial and labour sacrifices will act as investments for the future.

A Mid-Canterbury dairy farmer passionate about innovation and continued improvement has been named this year's winner of the New Zealand Zanda McDonald Award.

A farmer who failed to adequately feed cattle, treat worms and tend to ill and injured cattle, has been fined and banned from owning or managing animals for a decade.

Fear of a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine is the latest factor behind the surge in global dairy prices.

It’s 35 years since Roger Parkinson planted vines in Martinborough and this year he celebrates three decades as winemaker at Nga Waka. But it began in Paris, he tells Joelle Thomson.

It's been 10 years since the Christchurch earthquake forced Celia Hay out of her food and wine business in the city, and 2021 was another challenging year.

Joe Babich was on track to become a pharmacist, when he defied his mother's wishes and joined New Zealand's nascent wine industry instead.

Kim and Graham Gilkison were fishing in Northland in 2018 when inspiration flitted past.

It is all go for next week’s East Coast Farming Expo, albeit with plenty of attention on ensuring everyone is kept safe.

The arrival of the bacterial plant pathogen Xylella fastidiosa could decimate New Zealand’s $2 billion a year wine exports, lock down our vineyards, evaporate jobs and deprive us of a favoured local tipple. Covid-19 response tactics - coupled with high-tech solutions - could keep the vino flowing, reports Pamela Niskanen.